How to market a mobile app in a non-digital way?

[pavelatanassov]

Hi everyone!

I'm thrilled to be able to post my question in this community!

I am the founder of a small technology company based in Vienna, Austria, with one single product that we created in 2015 and are operating and developing further since then. It is a mobile app for organising photos and is called "Utiful Photo Organizer" (note: the original use case was to use the app for so-called "utility photos", this is where the name "Utiful" came from). The app is available on both iOS and Android already since 2015 and we have positioned it as the first photo organizer for neat freaks, which is because our early adopters titled themselves this way (or also as "Type A personalities").

I subscribed to the UKBF because the vast majority of our Europe-based users are in the UK (note: our biggest market is the USA) and I am trying to understand how to grow our UK-based user base.

Since the beginning, our user base is growing only organically. We have tried several times Facebook ads but to no positive ROI. We have tried also Apple App Store ads to find out that although there is a positive ROI, they can't scale. Google ads were a total loss. So for the last 3-4 years we refrained from digital advertisement and continued growing only organically. We are still profitable but I have realized recently that the growth started slowing down the last year. So I want to start exploring new growth options. I am hence looking for an advise how to market our mobile app in the UK in a non-digital way? I mean, I would like to physically reach the prospects (e.g. leaflets?) but any advise on what could work in the UK would be highly appreciated.

Thank you so much in advance for your help,
Pavel

 

[fisicx]

App users discover apps online. If you play online games you will discover loads of adverts. You also see promotions for apps on social media. You have influencers promoting apps.

If you want to get more users you need to do it online and you need to spend money.

That being said, I had a look at your app and really not sure what it does that I can’t already do on my phone.

 

[pavelatanassov]

App users discover apps online. If you play online games you will discover loads of adverts. You also see promotions for apps on social media. You have influencers promoting apps.

If you want to get more users you need to do it online and you need to spend money.

That being said, I had a look at your app and really not sure what it does that I can’t already do on my phone.

Thanks @fisicx for your reply! I agree with you, however as I mentioned we had no luck with online ads until now. Which is the reason I would like to try something "unconventional" if we'd call it this way. As for the app functionality: It provides a physically separate photo library on the phone, so one can put there those images that are not real photographs, e.g. work-related photos, screenshots with information and so on, so that the standard photo gallery remains for the real photos only (family, vacation), while the Utiful library holds everything else neatly sorted in folders and easy to find whenever needed.

 

[fisicx]

If your adverts didn’t work as expected maybe you were doing it wrong. Have you identified your target user? Have you tested a range of adverts on multiple platforms and measured performance.

Adverts and any other sort of online promotion are never fire and forget, they need constant monitoring and adjustment.

And I’m still not clear about your app. There appears to be a whole range of photo organisers, yours doesn’t really stand out. And it’s not free to use.

 

[pavelatanassov]

If your adverts didn’t work as expected maybe you were doing it wrong. Have you identified your target user? Have you tested a range of adverts on multiple platforms and measured performance.

Adverts and any other sort of online promotion are never fire and forget, they need constant monitoring and adjustment.

And I’m still not clear about your app. There appears to be a whole range of photo organisers, yours doesn’t really stand out. And it’s not free to use.

Regarding the online ads: Yes, you are right, and I thought the same way after we were trying and getting no ROI. So then I hired an ad agency to do the online ads. They had better performance than initially but considering the cost of the ad agency, still no ROI. Then I assigned one of the employees in my other company who was a statistician to keep downloading all data from the Facebook Ad Manager and profile it. As a result we improved the performance of the ads but still with negative ROI. Then I have given it up.

Regarding the UVP of our app: It lets people physically move photos out of their camera rolls. This is what our prospects google for and how they find us. The Apple Photos app as well as the Google Photos app (on iOS and Android, respectively) keep showing all photos in the so-called camera roll aka Recents. If you want to move some photos to an album, they get added by the standard Photos app to the album but still stay in the camera roll. People download our app and try it (it has a one month free trial) because it allows them to physically move their photos out of the camera roll to a folder structure of their own. So the organized photos do not appear anymore in the camera roll. People then stay and subscribe to our app because it fulfills what it promises and because it is totally easy to use and makes things look neat. The users try also other photo organizer apps and then come back to ours saying that although the other one is free or cheaper, ours is by far easier to use.

 

[fisicx]

This suggests only a small subset of potential users. Most people won’t be interested in this sort of app (including me) so you may be reaching the natural limit of downloads.

I found this on my plugins. Growth slows down after the initial phase and eventually almost stops. You have to change your marketing, add more features to the app. Maybe even build a different app.

Consider that many use WhatsApp to send and receive pictures. Can you extract and organise received image from this. Or save images from instagram or any other source.

Why did you just focus on FB for advertising? There are hundreds of different platforms you could have researched. TikTok for example. Or online games. Or even change your SEO keywords to increase reach.

Maybe even change the ‘neat geeks’ tagline -it put me off downloading the app.

 

[Ozzy]

The answer to your question would come out of doing some market research on your target audience.

I'm making an assumption here that your target market is business people who use their personal mobile phones for business use, so perhaps advertising in business magazines highlighting the problem you mention above (mixing personal holiday photos with business screenshots and photos).

In my area, there is a prominent business magazine and a business newspaper that is distributed to thousands of businesses in the county, and I know is read by everyone because everyone wants to read about everyone. You are asking about offline options, perhaps distributions like these could be worth trialling.

 

[pavelatanassov]

This suggests only a small subset of potential users. Most people won’t be interested in this sort of app (including me) so you may be reaching the natural limit of downloads.

I found this on my plugins. Growth slows down after the initial phase and eventually almost stops. You have to change your marketing, add more features to the app. Maybe even build a different app.

Consider that many use WhatsApp to send and receive pictures. Can you extract and organise received image from this. Or save images from instagram or any other source.

Why did you just focus on FB for advertising? There are hundreds of different platforms you could have researched. TikTok for example. Or online games. Or even change your SEO keywords to increase reach.

Maybe even change the ‘neat geeks’ tagline -it put me off downloading the app.

Thank you @fisicx, these are all valid points! I will discuss them with my team and will follow up on them!

 

[pavelatanassov]

The answer to your question would come out of doing some market research on your target audience.

I'm making an assumption here that your target market is business people who use their personal mobile phones for business use, so perhaps advertising in business magazines highlighting the problem you mention above (mixing personal holiday photos with business screenshots and photos).

In my area, there is a prominent business magazine and a business newspaper that is distributed to thousands of businesses in the county, and I know is read by everyone because everyone wants to read about everyone. You are asking about offline options, perhaps distributions like these could be worth trialling.

Thank you @Ozzy, this is a great advice! Do you mind sharing the name of the magazine? If the community rules do not allow to do so here, perhaps you can drop me an email? Would be much appreciated, thank you!

 

[ethical PR]

Who is your target customer ?

 

[pavelatanassov]

Who is your target customer ?

* Self-employed handymen (electricians, carpenters, plumbers etc.). They use the app to store before/after pictures of their client projects as well as photos of the different stages of the projects.

* Small businesses that produce goods (e.g. gadgets). They use the app to keep track of their inventory by making photos thereof as well as to document all orders they are shipping, just before they send them. (Especially the Android version of the app has gone quite a bit on that track following the feature requests by the businesses, e.g. with the app you can create a shortcut on the home screen of your phone that, when tapped on, let's you scan a barcode, then automatically creates a new folder with that code and starts the camera, so you can take pictures that will be automatically stored in this folder -- all this can be configured in the app as the business needs it)

* Other self-employed professionals who use photos to keep track of things or events for their work, like skin doctors, attorneys, private law enforcers and many others.

* Scrapbookers and other types of creative hobbyists / craftsmen, who use the app to store and organize their creations and the visual assets needed for them.

* Last but not least: Private individuals who are fed up with the photo organization imposed by Apple and Google.

 

[fisicx]

None of that comes out in the app description. The only thing you say is it’s for neat geeks.

 

[pavelatanassov]

None of that comes out in the app description. The only thing you say is it’s for neat geeks.

Point taken!

 

[ethical PR]

* Self-employed handymen (electricians, carpenters, plumbers etc.). They use the app to store before/after pictures of their client projects as well as photos of the different stages of the projects.

* Small businesses that produce goods (e.g. gadgets). They use the app to keep track of their inventory by making photos thereof as well as to document all orders they are shipping, just before they send them. (Especially the Android version of the app has gone quite a bit on that track following the feature requests by the businesses, e.g. with the app you can create a shortcut on the home screen of your phone that, when tapped on, let's you scan a barcode, then automatically creates a new folder with that code and starts the camera, so you can take pictures that will be automatically stored in this folder -- all this can be configured in the app as the business needs it)

* Other self-employed professionals who use photos to keep track of things or events for their work, like skin doctors, attorneys, private law enforcers and many others.

* Scrapbookers and other types of creative hobbyists / craftsmen, who use the app to store and organize their creations and the visual assets needed for them.

* Last but not least: Private individuals who are fed up with the photo organization imposed by Apple and Google.

Great you can use that information to build persona's for each group so you can better understand the best marketing channels and activities to reach them and build a funded marketing plan around the outcomes of your market research.

 

[Paul Kelly ICHYB]

* Self-employed handymen (electricians, carpenters, plumbers etc.). They use the app to store before/after pictures of their client projects as well as photos of the different stages of the projects.

Why do I NEED an app for that?

* Small businesses that produce goods (e.g. gadgets). They use the app to keep track of their inventory by making photos thereof as well as to document all orders they are shipping, just before they send them.

Ditto

Sorry to be pessimistic, but this solves a problem that doesn't exist (for most people).

 

[pavelatanassov]

Why do I NEED an app for that?


Ditto

Sorry to be pessimistic, but this solves a problem that doesn't exist (for most people).

Thanks for the feedback @Paul Kelly ICHYB!

I don't need my company to become a unicorn, so I am OK if the problem we solve has a small user base, provided it allows me to have a profitable business that pays my bills.

As mentioned, we're on the market since 2015 and are profitable by only having grown organically. The subscription for the iOS version of the app in the UK is 39.99 GBP a year and our UK users gladly pay it because it solves them a problem that's worth it. The user descriptions I provided above are not invented by me but the feedback from real users who contact us to thank us for a great product and to suggest further improvements. (Worth mentioning: There's no lock-in in the app, users can anytime export all their organized photo folders and subfolders and they get exported exactly as they are in the app, so one can continue using them on their computer or in another app of their choice. So the reason people do not cancel their subscription is not that they're "locked-in" in the app.)

 

[Paul Kelly ICHYB]

So the reason people do not cancel their subscription is not that they're "locked-in" in the app.)

Never suggested that - sadly, for some, renewals will go unnoticed or users become complacent.

If you want to increase exposure, you need to get it listed on the 'top photo utility' lists that are all over the place e.g. https://www.tomsguide.com/best-picks/best-photo-organizer-apps

You should also examples of use on your website that could increase search engine exposure when people are looking for a specific use, such as those you listed.

Also, please remember that 39.99 a year may be a barrier to better growth.

 

[pavelatanassov]

Never suggested that - sadly, for some, renewals will go unnoticed or users become complacent.

If you want to increase exposure, you need to get it listed on the 'top photo utility' lists that are all over the place e.g. https://www.tomsguide.com/best-picks/best-photo-organizer-apps

You should also examples of use on your website that could increase search engine exposure when people are looking for a specific use, such as those you listed.

Also, please remember that 39.99 a year may be a barrier to better growth.

Thank you @Paul Kelly ICHYB!

It is true that users sometime simply forget to cancel a subscription. At least in iOS case however this doesn't go unnoticed because you get emails from Apple prior to the renewal and upon renewal, after which you have 2 weeks (if not even 4) to cancel and get a full refund, which is a feature of the Apple App Store. Whether or not our users become complacent I cannot judge.

Regarding the 'top photo utility' lists: Thank you for the tip! I now immediately wrote an email to the advertizing department of Future (the owner company of Tom's list). I am aware of such lists but haven't contacted because of some "inner brake" (fear that it might cost a fortune), my fault.

A new version of the website and the app description is already in the making, also considering the feedback from @fisicx that "photo organizer for neat freaks" might put people off.

Regarding the price: We have run really a lot of price experiments over the years. The price not only can influence growth, it can indirectly define the target customer. The fact that the app is subscription-based and at the current price is due to the realization we made at some point that the app is quite often used by self-employed and freelancers. So we deliberately decided to go closer to this segment by lifting the bar. There's also another important aspect of a (relatively) high price: users have higher expectations and are hence more critical and provide very honest feedback, which is crucial for improving the app.

 

[fisicx]

Doesn’t really change the fact that this is a very niche product with a limited user base.

The pictures on my phone are synced with my laptop. I can organise them into albums and add them to websites and social media without any issues. I’ve shown them to clients and don’t have any problems with organisation.

There is a place for photo organisers apps just like anything else but you may be reaching to top end of the user curve.

 

[pavelatanassov]

Also, please remember that 39.99 a year may be a barrier to better growth.

Regarding the price and the perceived app value, maybe it's best described by the following recent review by a user from the USA:

Deleted the app - too expensive
***** (5 stars)​

by hsv_guy – Edited Nov 15, 2023
Update….. I renewed at the new rate! After the developer reached out to me, I realized that I had made a huge mistake in canceling my subscription prior to the renewal date. Had I let it renew automatically, it would have done so at the $19.95 annual subscription rate, as I was grandfathered in - as it had done before. I jumped to conclusions when I should have contacted the developers. At any rate, Pavel was helpful and supportive, as he has always been. He made me a very generous offer, but I decided to renew my subscription at the new rate. The app is that good. I had tried another app which provided the same functionality, but not nearly as elegantly, and nowhere near the same level of support. ORIGINAL REVIEW: This is an amazing app, and the developer is very responsive. I've been using it almost from the beginning, and I've watched as the developers added many wonderful features. I was happy to purchase it initially, and when the subscription model was introduced, I held my nose, bit the bullet and paid the 19.95 annual subscription. The app is that good. However, when it came time to renew again, the price had doubled to 39.95 a year. Sorry, but I just can't justify the expense. So, sadly, I am deleting the app. Bummer!

What clearly distinguishes us from other apps is that we offer from the very beginning is customer support. This has proven to be solid gold. It seems that there are just a few app providers that do have a customer support, which is also helpful and fast like we are. Our users confirmed early enough that they prefer paying for an app that has a customer support rather than using a free app with the same functionality by a Japanese developer who never replies.

 

[Paul Kelly ICHYB]

What clearly distinguishes us from other apps is that we offer from the very beginning is customer support.

Nope, everyone offers CS, but at different levels.

in the ideal world, you never want a customer to go near CS!

 

[fisicx]

The problem @pavelatanassov is you have built an app that appears to a certain type of person and have extrapolated that to suggest it’s ideal for a range of business type when that’s not the case.

 

[pavelatanassov]

The problem @pavelatanassov is you have built an app that appears to a certain type of person and have extrapolated that to suggest it’s ideal for a range of business type when that’s not the case.

Well I hope you are not right But it can be that you are. My task is to give it a try. It's my business.

 

[fisicx]

If it’s an app for tradesmen to organise their pictures into projects you need to sell it as that. But why would a builder want to add a caption to a picture of a house they are building?

It’s also not clear if you can access utiful from apps like WhatsApp. Or upload to instagram from utiful. The only thing it really offers is the organiser. And you can already do that without an app.

Change your marketing and change the app to make it less niche.

 

[A.C Consultant]

* Self-employed handymen (electricians, carpenters, plumbers etc.). They use the app to store before/after pictures of their client projects as well as photos of the different stages of the projects.

* Small businesses that produce goods (e.g. gadgets). They use the app to keep track of their inventory by making photos thereof as well as to document all orders they are shipping, just before they send them. (Especially the Android version of the app has gone quite a bit on that track following the feature requests by the businesses, e.g. with the app you can create a shortcut on the home screen of your phone that, when tapped on, let's you scan a barcode, then automatically creates a new folder with that code and starts the camera, so you can take pictures that will be automatically stored in this folder -- all this can be configured in the app as the business needs it)

* Other self-employed professionals who use photos to keep track of things or events for their work, like skin doctors, attorneys, private law enforcers and many others.

* Scrapbookers and other types of creative hobbyists / craftsmen, who use the app to store and organize their creations and the visual assets needed for them.

* Last but not least: Private individuals who are fed up with the photo organization imposed by Apple and Google.

If we hypothesize that your app was developed based on market research and tested with potential buyers, it seems it still faces challenges in achieving the expected ROI. A key issue, common among many businesses, is attempting to target too broadly. For instance, targeting 5 different avatars/ideal clients/buyer personas leads to diluted messaging because each requires a tailored approach. This scattershot strategy is often unrealistic.

Focusing on a single group allows you to become their go-to expert, leveraging word-of-mouth and partnerships—two highly effective marketing methods. While paid media can augment your reach, it should primarily enhance organic efforts. Over-reliance on paid channels without organic traction can be costly and less trustworthy to consumers.

Does this insight help clarify your current marketing challenges?